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Bobcats fit for defense, need help with offense
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Raymond Felton (AP Images)
The NBA regular season is just two months away, and the Charlotte Bobcats have done little to help their 27th ranked offense push for playoff contention.
When Charlotte sent center Emeka Okafor packing in exchange for Tyson Chandler from New Orleans, it was a good move, financially.
Okafor has five years remaining on a six-year, $72 million contract, while Chandler is due $11.85 million next season with a $12.75 million option for 2010-11, which he would be insane not to accept with the current economy and players having to settle for smaller contracts entering this season.
There is no long-term commitment with Chandler, as opposed to Okafor, which is perfect for a team like Charlotte that is severely hurting financially.
NBA Fanhouse has reported that Larry Brown wishes for Chandler to backup power forward Boris Diaw, a move that would have its pros, but mostly cons.
The Bobcats currently have four centers on their roster with Chandler, DeSagana Diop, Nazr Mohammed and Alexis Ajinca. They would love to be able to dump either Diop or Mohammed to relieve cap space, but no teams appear willing to take either one on.
Charlotte did not extend Sean May’s contract, which has left a gap at the backup power forward position. Head coach Larry Brown may be looking to go with Diop and Mohammed as Charlotte’s one-two centers and will be comfortable with Chandler coming of the bench at power forward to give a defensive boost.
Charlotte was ranked seventh in the league last year in defense, and they may grace the NBA’s top five in 2009-10, but with non-athletic centers in the game such as Diop or Mohammed, and possibly Chandler at power forward who creates little offense for himself, the Bobcats will only be hurting their case to put points on the board and relying too much on guys like Gerald Wallace and Raja Bell.
The Bobcats were able to acquire Duke University’s Gerald Henderson and Xavier University’s Derrick Brown through the draft, but expecting offense from first-year players is rarely a good way to enter a season.
However, point guard D.J. Augustin did it last year for Charlotte, averaging 11.8 points and 3.5 assists per game coming off the bench as he backed up Raymond Felton.
Both Henderson and Brown had solid collegiate careers. If they can convince coach Brown to give them minutes, putting up Augustin-like numbers would be considered highly successful.
But this still leaves Charlotte without a go-to scorer at point guard.
The Bobcats have yet to resign point guard Raymond Felton, who averaged 14.2 points and 6.7 assists per game last season, which leaves the Bobcats organization with two options…
Re-sign Raymond Felton or sign fourteen-year veteran and former MVP, Allen Iverson.
The Memphis Grizzlies have reportedly offered Iverson a contract twice this summer, and he has yet to sign, possibly with hopes of either signing with the Bobcats or the Miami Heat, two teams that appear to be interested and make a stronger case for the playoffs.
The only reasonable explanation for the Bobcats not resigning their only successful point guard in franchise history, Raymond Felton, is that they are working on trying to reunite Iverson with his old coach, Larry Brown.
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